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A large crowd of over 40 members turned out on Friday 5 May to welcome members from the Leeds Magical Association who came along to present a magic show for the Bradford Magic Circle members following our presentation to them last year.
Colin Gough, acting in his role as a Leeds MA member, compered the show, and gave us several of his jokes throughout the evening, some of which even got laughs!
Mike Coyne started the show with a mixture of magic and gags. He covered a die with a silk. The die disappeared and changed into a flower. A nice Troublewit routine was followed by match to flower and streamers from a mini-dove pan. Multiplying bananas kept reappearing throughout the act; even making an appearance as a floating banana. Silks and streamer from a dove pan led to Mike finally producing a large bouquet from a vase, which had been a running gag all the way through his act. A very good act to get the show going.
Tony Rudland performed a couple of card tricks with assistants from the audience. Despite having problems with the cards he bravely soldiered on to get the correct outcome at the end.
Colin did his compere role by taking a pen from his pocket and taking a coin out of it. He placed the coin back in and took it out several times, whilst the next act got ready. This turned out to be Bradford's own Alan Driffield, making his first magical performance for six years. This been said, he was soon into the smooth routine we have always associated with him. With an optical story, he held a board on which the colour kept changing from red to blue to yellow as he turned it around. Then spots appeared before finally a pair of glasses - in this glasses full of drink - brought the story to an end. Ross chose an ESP symbol from the 5 different symbols proffered by Alan. Alan put the 5 cards on a stand. Alan turned his back and said that Ross had to take out a card and hold it up. He, Alan, would say if that was Ross's chosen card or not. Ross did this several times, until Alan finally identified the card. He was helped as, when Ross picked up the chosen card, the stand buzzed! This got a big laugh. Alan gave Alison the chance to win a prize from inside his locked box. He demonstrated that only one of five keys opened the box. These were mixed and then Alison gave 4 keys to members of the audience; she kept the remaining key. This turned out to be the correct one as it opened the box. Finally Alan did a 6 card repeat effect with 9 cards, where he kept dropping cards on the floor but still had 9 left. An excellent spot by a real professional.
Colin did his ring on/off rope routine, whilst Paul Dawson was setting up. Paul, a new member of the Leeds MA, performed a silent act in, what I would term, a modern idiom. Vanishing cane to silk led into an appearing candle. Taking off his one black & one white glove, he threw them out to show that they had turned into a coloured streamer. Card manipulations and a cane production followed; the cane being split into two canes. An overlong linking rings routine led into sponge balls and a finale of Snowstorm in China. This young man shows a lot of promise and with a bit of guidance could go a long way.
Not surprisingly after this mess, we had our tea break, whilst Colin and the gang cleared up.
Peter Bainbridge opened the second half with a card effect involving Stevie B. Colin then introduced Matthew Scott, another new member of the Leeds MA. He gave a very confident display of magic and gags. Starting with torn & restored newspaper, he then produced boxes of flowers from an empty paper bag. He found a chosen card replaced in the deck; then found a card which was mixed in a deck face up and face down. A four ace routine and rabbit sponge ball routine led into his final effect – a prediction. Matthew showed a board with 10 cards down attached. Steve Naylor chose card number 6; which was the 10H. Steve Gore opened a prediction which Matthew had given him before the start of the show – this contained the 10H. Another promising performance by a newcomer to magic.
Graham Roe finished the evening with a demonstration of dice stacking. Starting with three dice, Graham was attempting to become the World Dice Stacking Champion – a position he had previously held with 25 dice, which had been increased to 26 by a rival for the title. Eventually Graham had out 27 dice and a very large cup. Unfortunately he did not quite manage to get to 27, but he did manage 26, which was excellent. Afterwards Steve Naylor was shown demonstrating just how hard it was to do as he struggled with three dice!
The evening finished with the whole of the Leeds crowd receiving a long and enthusiastic round of applause.
Everyone enjoyed the evening, and I am sure that this is a type of evening we should be trying to encourage with other local societies.
